Alex's swim journal

Reverse Taper... reverse carbo-loading?!

So coming off the 2.4-mile OW swim (and btw, the official time was 1:16:02, which placed me 58th out of 100 in the non-wetsuit category and would have placed me 77th out of 289 among wet-suited swimmers... I was 4th in age group among non-wetsuite swimmers, but my time would have placed me 8th out of 42 in the wetsuit category; which I feel pretty good about!), anyway... coming off the swim Saturday I decided to impose a reverse taper. I did 2000 in Lake Andrea yesterday. 3000 at the Y today. Here's what I did:

I'll probably get back to the lake tomorrow morning before heading into work; the days have been a little warmer this week, so the water temps are climbing slightly again.

FEED TROUGH NEWS:

I forgot to mention that after the race on Saturday I stopped into Monty's Blue Plate Diner in Madison. I did a search on the internet for restaurants in Madison with Vegan options. I've all but stopped going to restaurants here in Kenosha, because there are not that many vegan options... vegetarian and vegan are not the same thing and you always have to wonder if that vegetarian dish has hidden dairy or eggs. These are things that never would have occurred to me before, but I'm constantly thinking about now. Saturday night after I got back, for example, the family wanted to go out... they chose Italian, which I used to love doing. But, where eating vegetarian in Italian restaurants was always pretty easy, going completely vegan basically limited me to two items on the menu... and even those made me wonder; just because it has garden fresh vegetables, doesn't mean it wasn't swimming in butter just a few seconds before plating. To avoid those possibilities I find it easier just to stay at home and make my own.

My family is fairly sympathetic to my diet (My wife even apologized for asking for grated cheese on the salad Saturday night... "Oh, I guess I shouldn't have done that if you wanted some"; it was ok, I was having the minestrone soup anyway), though I think they might be annoyed with me at times. They know I'm doing it for my health, which is where I began five weeks ago (today marks 35 days I have been vegan), but I'm trying to explain that it's become something much more than that now... it's coming from a place of compassion and mindfulness that is so much more powerful than mere self-discipline.

Anyway, this is why I really appreciate places that proudly offer true vegan options on their menu. Here's the sweet potato hash with tofu scrambler with rice toast that I had at Monty's on Saturday...

The idea of tofu with spinach hadn't occurred to me before, but it was yummy and I'll try it again here at the house. The sweet potatoes had some yummy spices... think I detected curry.

Comments

Monty's always had promo spots as a sponsor on the Madison NPR station when I was there. Great place. As a vegan, I would imagine you'd have plenty of options in Madison; I get that it might be a bit harder in Kenosha.

Monty's always had promo spots as a sponsor on the Madison NPR station when I was there. Great place. As a vegan, I would imagine you'd have plenty of options in Madison; I get that it might be a bit harder in Kenosha.

Yes. Madison, like Austin, is a pretty special place... as so many of the big college towns are. Wonderful, quirky, independent restaurants and stores on every corner. I like Kenosha well enough, it's a nice small city of about 100,000, but outside of a handful of restaurants you have to make the drive up to Milwaukee if you want some place that caters to vegans (or at least recognizes that as a possibility). But, hey, it's the dairy state... so my expectations have come down! Monty's has restored my faith in WI!

If you are a breakfast food fan, pick up Vegan Brunch. Tons of yum in there.

I do like the breakfast foods and have been experimenting with pancakes of different sorts (any excuse to use cinnamon!) and tofu is an awesome sub for eggs. I'll have to check out Vegan Brunch for some new ideas. Thanks!